A wisp of hope

An unsent message to my daughter, written last year.

Although I can no longer look at you, I picture the image you left the last time you came into my place, filling my formerly safe space with danger and pain. You were so thin that I swear I could see the white of those bones which threaten to crumble to dust while I still live. Your skin a strange hue that defies description. Angry sores on your face. Blank eyes swimming in madness.

What do you want from me? Could it be that you feel the need of a mother’s love? Do you wish for sympathy or are you simply driven by the desire for drug money? I cannot give you any of these things. Even my love for you is locked so deep inside that it cannot be released.

I don’t ask you to listen. I write this not for you, but for me. Wrapped in your soft, blood-stained armour of golden brown liquid, you cannot hear me now, and when your inability to score strips you naked you are in too much pain to feel anything but your need for more poison.

Heroin submerges, deep beneath her lies, what you once knew to be the truth. She tells you you need her in order to survive, and although something inside you whispers that you are going to die, it no longer seems such a high price to pay because your sight is too dimmed to see what that means.

She led you to care so little for your life that any drug would do. Now she keeps her distance as you trip through amphetamine insanity, with black, staring eyes, and limbs akimbo. She lets the leash stretch knowing you are still within her reach.

These words are bent out of shape and refuse to be a goodbye. Hard as I try I cannot make them say what I wish you to know before you go, because within me a wisp of hope still exists.

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Author: janebasilblog

Jane sits around and writes a bit, then she does some other stuff, then she sits around and writes a bit more, then she eats something. Sometimes, at night, she goes to bed.
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17 thoughts on “A wisp of hope”

These words are bent out of shape and refuse to be a goodbye. Hard as I try I cannot make them say what I wish you to know before you go, because within me a wisp of hope still exists. I think as long as you can write this, you will be able to deal with it all… {{{Jane}}}

Sometimes it doesn’t feel like it. The housing association have put off giving me an assured tenancy (I currently have a shorthold tenancy) because of Laura turning up and causing a nuisance. Luckily my landlords see me as a victim, and are being supportive. They’re contacting an outreach worker to see whether he can house her somehow – although it’s been looked at before, and with her background and reputation her options are limited. If she turns up I’ve been told to call the police, sho will probably try to take her to her father’s place.
My housing status will be reviewed again in six months time.
So you see, I’ve stopped talking about it. I’m too depressed and exhausted.

Idoworryabout that – although I’m lucky. This is sheltered housing, and I’m considered to be vulnerable, so they’re doing the best they can for me. If I had a private landlord it could be difficult…
I try not to feel humiliated, but it’s not easy. It feels as if I’m living someone else’s life – what is happening to me is not who I am.

One day at a time.I so feel for you. One of my close friends has a relative who is severely addicted. When he uses she gets death threats and all sorts of nasty things. Police say their hands are tied because he mostly doesn’t follow through – yet sometimes does. It is so very hard on families.

She gets death threats – that serves to remind me how lucky I am. Their hands are tied because he MOSTLY doesn’t follow through? What happened to the concept of crime prevention?
My heart goes out to that addict’s suffering family, and all of those other families out there. I’ve almost stopped caring about the addicts themselves, except in relation to their loved ones.

It has been THE most frustrating thing !! The stories I could tell you would make your hair curl in outrage, but then you’ve probably heard them all. The police have finally put a restraining order out after the latest social media threats.

I am an addict active in my humiliation. I do not wish to be who I am. I still tell the truth to those who ask. My honesty in not a welcome thing. The questions are asked, I’m ashamed but why hide? The truth is I’m an addict and I’m hell bent to die. I am sorry your scared. But fuck so are we. You want my advice. Do not enable addiction. Do not get mad when you hear the truth. Remind her you love her and your her mom no matter the what. Accept that it’s hard as fuck trying to want a way out. For many of us the clean side ain’t that swell. The world that knows us knows all our sin, the pressure from the cheering team and then the nay sayers. Please just love her, answer every single call. Never turn your back on her as my family did.

Thank you for your open response. Respect to you.
I can’t have Laura in my home because I will be evicted if I let her through the door, and a part of her would like that to happen, because she wishes to destroy all that she loves. It’s hard to meet her outside for several reasons; she rarely communicates, although she sometimes shouts obscenities at me in the street, she can’t focus on simple sentences, she’s in the grip of psychosis from supplementing her habit with amphetamines, seeing me triggers her self-harming behaviour, and she tries to follow me home.
All this may sound petty, but two of my children are addicts (one is in recovery) and they have both placed me at the centre of their addictions for years. I’ve had to resuscitate my son, tolerate gun carrying crack dealers taking over my attic, I’ve been robbed to the point where I haven’t been able to afford food or heating, my grandchildren have been put at risk, particularly my eldest one, who has seen things he should never have seen at the age of fourteen, I’ve had heavies outside my house threatening to break the door down, I had to shop my son to the police because prison was the only way to keep him alive (it worked) and the list goes on.
All those years of strain have affected me. I have days when I can’t leave my flat – not even to go to the communal laundry room, because I’m so paranoid. I suffer from exhaustion and dizzy spells and I don’t want to go to bed because I don’t want to wake up.
I’ve done everything I can to support and encourage Laura without enabling her addiction. I’ve worked with the police, the drugs services and the psychiatrists for years, but nothing has prevented her downward spiral. She’s reached the point where addicts no longer want to know her, and is terribly lonely and unhappy, but I’ll stay out of her way as long as she refuses to go back onto her anti-psychotic medication, because she knows and accepts that it would help her, but she won’t take that first step. If you can advise me on that subject, I ‘d be very grateful.
I grab at every straw, and I feel as if you’ve just handed me a straw. It’s possible that you and Laura have similar difficulties, though you’re clearly more in control of your mind.
I think this must be the longest message I’ve ever written on WP…